@ziarul_gandul started #cometoromania on the heels of #avoidbritainRecently, a lot of cyber-ink has been flowing re: the British xenophobia and more specifically, the fear that waves of Romanians and Bulgarians will invade Britain in search of non-existent jobs or, even worse, of welfare payments.

And then, I’ve found the following critique of “Half our women look like Kate, the other half like her sister”:

“Our women” are not ours, because we didn’t buy them from their parents for goats or parcels of land. I know that bride-stealing and the gipsy slave markets are still fresh in the minds of nostalgic compatriots, but ownership of a person or, worse, of one gender is somewhat obsolete. I know that we are considered a hot spot for human trafficking, but I would not brag about that.

Someone replied:

I beg to differ. The whole thing is a joke and the kind of people who are put off by or afraid of Eastern European immigrants are also likely to "dig" that "our women" comment, sexist as it may be. Perhaps to keep it gender neutral, GMP (or any Romanian woman / over-chivalrous man potentially insulted) should've included a statement about men for tha ladies, such as "Most of our men are uglier than David Beckham, but they play much better with their many balls." - or something like it.

LE: There is also a more serious dimension to all this, as competently articulated by a UK blog. Namely, that the position adopted by the British government is logically or perhaps, more so, morally, untenable: you can't desire access to the European market and liberalization for financial services while denying your customers and your small businesses access to each other. Read the whole shabang.

@ziarul_gandul started #cometoromania on the heels of #avoidbritainRecently, a lot of cyber-ink has been flowing re: the British xenophobia and more specifically, the fear that waves of Romanians and Bulgarians will invade Britain in search of non-existent jobs or, even worse, of welfare payments.

And then, I’ve found the following critique of “Half our women look like Kate, the other half like her sister”:

“Our women” are not ours, because we didn’t buy them from their parents for goats or parcels of land. I know that bride-stealing and the gipsy slave markets are still fresh in the minds of nostalgic compatriots, but ownership of a person or, worse, of one gender is somewhat obsolete. I know that we are considered a hot spot for human trafficking, but I would not brag about that.

Someone replied:

I beg to differ. The whole thing is a joke and the kind of people who are put off by or afraid of Eastern European immigrants are also likely to "dig" that "our women" comment, sexist as it may be. Perhaps to keep it gender neutral, GMP (or any Romanian woman / over-chivalrous man potentially insulted) should've included a statement about men for tha ladies, such as "Most of our men are uglier than David Beckham, but they play much better with their many balls." - or something like it.

LE: There is also a more serious dimension to all this, as competently articulated by a UK blog. Namely, that the position adopted by the British government is logically or perhaps, more so, morally, untenable: you can't desire access to the European market and liberalization for financial services while denying your customers and your small businesses access to each other. Read the whole shabang.